This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
This film resonates with a certain demographic - Romanian emigrants, Romanian wives, Romanian mothers, daughters, sisters, who left abroad only to have a figure in their life wanting to bring them back, not realising that certain things abroad can change you on a fundamental level, while they themselves remain unchanged.
And when they meet again, after months or years... what then, the movie asks.
I know these people. I am a child of these people - on a deeply personal…
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The quality and cinematography of Romanian films in the early 2010's is not the best, and this can be clearly seen.
However, Gabriel Spahiu is amazing as the main actor, and he does a wonderful job in transporting you to the time period. Everyone, in fact, is doing a wonderful job in portraying the regular life of romanians in the '80s. The plot is simple, you…
This movie does hit differently when you're Romanian. It hits abusively, it hits unhealthy power dynamics, it hits hard but does not want to comment on the politics of queer eastern europeans or eastern europeans coming to work in the West.
Don't get me wrong. Like many romanians, especially immigrants, especially those that yearn for more LGBT representation, I deeply wanted to love this. It made it internationally, it was showered with appreciation and glory and beaming reviews...
I know…
As a note: we Romanians don't care how it is in the US and how Colectiv makes you shudder thinking about Trump/Biden. 2 completely different kind of horses, so please stop the comparisons and 'oh the American people must watch this to understand just how bad it can be/get' or 'oh the tragedy of Romanians and their healthcare is relevant to the American people in 2020'.
Romania allocates a big part of the state budget on American military bases to…
